Fockers & Coens Shoot It Out for XMas Box Office

The ComingSoon.net Box Office Report has been updated with studio estimates for the weekend. Click here for the full box office estimates of the top 12 films and then check back on Monday for the final figures based on actual box office.

Christmas weekend saw a number of surprises, although the comedy Little Fockers (Universal), reuniting Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro, winning the weekend wasn’t one of them, even if its weekend gross of $34 million and $48.3 million since opening on Wednesday was less than expected based on the success of its predecessor. The threequel was down 31% from the opening week of Meet the Fockers, which made $70 million in its first five days, opening over Christmas Day six years ago, before going on to make over $270 million total.

Opening in second place, Joel and Ethan Coen’s Western True Grit (Paramount), starring Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon and newcomer Hailee Steinfeld, did a fantastic $25.6 million over the three-day weekend following its $11.2 million gross on Wednesday and Thursday. It was the Coens’ widest release to date as well as their biggest opening, surpassing the $19.1 million opening of Burn After Reading in 2008. It shouldn’t have much of a problem passing the $74 million gross of the Coens’ Oscar-winning No Country for Old Men. The movie also marked the second-highest opening for a Western after Will Smith’s bomb Wild Wild West, and after just five days, it’s the 14th-highest grossing Western ever and it should end up in the Top 10 for the genre.

Disney’s TRON: Legacy, also starring Jeff Bridges with Garrett Hedlund and Olivia Wilde, dropped to third place with $20.1 million, down a whopping 54% from its opening weekend. With $88.3 million total, it is a long way off from making back its $170 million production budget. $4.7 million of that weekend take, roughly 23%, was made in domestic IMAX 3D.

One of the big surprises was the strong hold for Fox Walden’s The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which took advantage of the holidays to bring in $10.8 million, down just 13% in its third weekend, bringing its total to $63.9 million domestically. It is still a far cry from its $155 million production budget.

The family film Yogi Bear (Warner Bros) dropped from second place to fifth with $8.8 million, down 46% from its opening weekend, with $36.8 million grossed to date.

David O. Russell’s The Fighter starring Mark Wahlberg, Christian Bale, Amy Adams and Melissa Leo, had a solid 30% hold from its previous weekend, bringing in $8.5 million over Christmas weekend for sixth place. The film has grossed $27.5 million after three weeks.

The Jack Black adventure-comedy Gulliver’s Travels (20th Century Fox) bombed over the weekend, bringing in an estimated $7.2 million in its first two days, averaging less than $3,000 per site despite being released in 3D.

Darren Aronofsky’s psychological thriller Black Swan, starring Natalie Portman, dropped to eighth place with $6.6 million and $29 million total since opening on December 3. That makes it Aronofsky’s highest-grossing movie to date.

That was followed in ninth by Disney’s animated Tangled with $6.5 million and $144 million since opening over Thanksgiving weekend.

Columbia Pictures’ The Tourist, starring Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp, took tenth place with $5.7 million and has reached $41.2 million, less than half of its $100 million production budget.

A month after opening, Tom Hooper’s The King’s Speech (Weinstein Company), starring Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush, expanded nationwide on Christmas Day into 700 theaters, where it brought in $4.6 million over the weekend with a per-site average of $6.5k. It has grossed $8.4 million to date.

Sofia Coppola’s Somewhere (Focus Features) opened in seven theaters on Wednesday and brought in $196,000 in its first five days, while Gwyneth Paltrow’s Country Strong (Screen Gems opened in Los Angeles and Nashville on Wednesday but only brought in a slim $17.3 thousand. It’s planned for a wide release on January 7.

Opening on Christmas Day, Sylvain Chomet’s animated The Illusionist (Sony Pictures Classics) made $50.6k in two days in three theaters in New York and L.A.